milliways_bar | (no subject)

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[OOM: After Bran reclaimed his harp from the lake and went home, Bran and his da had a quiet holiday, and an interesting conversation.]

Harpsong winds through the front of Milliways. Owen Davies holds open the door so that Bran can go through first, and follows after. Both men are dressed in their Sunday best.

Bran goes immediately to the bar, where he receives a gift and a note. As he reads the note, his jaw tightens.

[ooc: Yes, they're both here. Please ping before tagging, though.]

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The very air is heavy with the weight of the risen power, but it is enough. Enough to distract her, for one crucial second, as she turns, balanced in the fury of the storm that is her own.

Enough that she looks at him, ice-blue, ice-bright gaze on his, surprised.

"You would bargain with me?" A beat. "You, Gwion harper? Now?"

Another beat.

"What, then?"

The Rider's power is rising, a shrieking storm and a silent oppressive weight in the air, and Will gathers his own strength instantly to match, words of the Old Speech in his mind and a strange brightness about him, like a swirling pillar of light only half-glimpsed. The Dark is rising with deep winter, but still they are paired and matched, and he can meet her strength; he can shield Owen Davies, and Bran and himself, and he is ready to, about to cry the word--

And Gwion is there.

Will holds himself taut, and does not look away from the White Rider. Not now.

The air, he thinks, is holding its breath.

A wash of wary gratitude, and of uneasiness. What are you planning, Gwion?

Carefully -- so carefully, and with love -- he slides the string off his wrist, and holds it out, standing straight.

"This."

His chest rises, and falls -- a steadying breath.

"For one of those lovely flowers in your hair."

And Gwion smiles, the lines in his face creasing and deepening with the weight and freedom of sincerity.

"One thing of the Lost Land for another."

There's art in everything. Craft, too.

And this -- this, too, is Making.

How long has it been since he has called Cantref y Gwaelod, the Lowland Hundred, by that particular name, after all?

Her hand rises to her hair, unconsciously-- fingertips brushing lightly over the delicate flowers, shaped from frost, from memory.

A copy only, a mimicry of what once was.

Moving slowly, Blodwen pulls the brightness of the two remaining flowers from her brown hair, and holds them out to Gwion.

"They will not last, I am afraid." The light voice is soft, strangely quiet-- and yet clear as a bell of silver, cutting through the taut silence.

"Nothing does, in the end."

Owen does not know what is being traded, nor why, but he sees Gwion's smile -- strange, at such a time -- and the glinting flowers in Blodwen's hair.

Very quietly, he says, "That is how it should be."

As Gwion takes the flowers, he looks at Owen sharply -- and then strangely. And then smiles.

He holds the flowers in an open palm, and looks down at them as he speaks.

"I am sure that you remember what my land was like in the days of its glory -- you spent enough time there." Gwion looks up, and gives her a quick smile -- nothing of animosity, and why should there be? The Lowland Hundred was a land of many wonders, there for all to see.

He looks down at the flowers again. "Full of Makers, it was. We Made such beautiful things -- smelted, forged, sculpted, wrote, sang, danced, dreamed -- and why? To capture something that had been, or that could be, and was not. We know well what loss is. It is our business."

The fingers of his other hand come close to touching the other flowers, and do not.

"I wish that I could help you see what it is to create, Blodwen Rowlands. But I cannot." He's not looking down any more, and his smile is sad. "So I will create for you. And that is my choice to do so -- and my honor. And I do wish you well."

Bran almost forgets his fury for his awe. Lightly, he touches the golden vines on the harp that Gwion made for the High Magic and the Wild Magic.

The harpstring is tangled still in Gwion's fingers, gleaming brightly under the shining white of the flowers in his palm.

She does not take it from him. Blodwen lets her hand fall to her side, and stands still. Her glance flicks to Owen, and to Bran-- but then returns to Gwion, and lingers there.

"To capture something that was not," she says slowly. "And to keep something of it. I think... that I shall wish you better success in your seeking, harper, than I myself have found."

And with that, the White Rider leaps up on the wind of her storm, and is gone.

The silence, when she is gone, is utter.

Will looks at Gwion.

He says nothing, but his face has softened into a grave sorrow far too old for his features. Thank you, he does not say, but it is there to be seen.

And the gifts put into some men, he half thinks and half remembers, shall light the dark corners of life for all the rest.

In so brave a world.

It is there to be seen; Gwion catches the end of it, for he is busy working the string of his harp around his wrist again. Where it belongs.

And when his dark eyes catch Will's, the harper gives him the old smile -- the one that is wry, and fond, and crinkles the lines at the edges of his eyes.

Quietly: "Well, now."

Will's eyes warm in response, a smile that barely touches his lips.

"Yes," says Owen. The fury that crackled through him is gone now; he looks drained, old and weary. There is a moment of silence, and then he adds, with a faint echo of his everyday fussiness, "It is late. We should be getting home, Bran bach."

Bran nods. He, too, seems suddenly exhausted. A long look traded with Will, and he moves towards the door, with his father. He holds Taliesin's golden harp close.

As the door swings closed, Owen slips an arm briefly around his son's waist.

Will lingers.

Gwion is looking at the flowers again.

Slow, he says, "They cannot create things for themselves. I think -- this is held together by the power of the Dark." And now he looks at Will. "I do not think I can take them back with me, can I."

Will reaches out, but does not touch the frost-flowers. His arm falls back to his side.

He shakes his head.

Quietly, "They would be only snow. It is her power that holds them as they are. Without it they would fall to pieces."

The harper nods, and is silent for a moment.

"I will ask the Bar to keep them for me, I think. That will do." A small smile. "A gift freely given, by one of the Riders of the Dark. I did not think I would see this day, Will Stanton."

"No."

Poor Blodwen, he thinks, and yet knows in the deepest part of him that it changes nothing. She is still bound by what she has chosen to be.

Blodwen will not last, in extremity. Only the Rider.

Will looks at Gwion, with a crooked ghost of a smile.

"Nor I."

"What is driving her is what she has lost. That is what she told me -- and what I told Merlion." He shakes his head slightly. "And after seeing this...well. I am not convinced that she was lying, or that I was wrong."

Something in his gaze sharpens, then, as though he is coming back to the present.

Time is a slippery thing.

"He said he'd be in the library, for a time. I should find him." And the old smile, again. "I bid you a good evening."

"Good night, Gwion."

The quiet, tiny smile back.

A well-wishing.

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